Before Ivan Lendl became Adidas` flagship player at the beginning of 1981, heavily popularizing Adidas as tennis brand in the following years, in the 70s Illie Nastase was the most prominent representative of Adidas. In the Lendl era, four different Ivan Lendl designs were launched in the course of the 80s, with the rhombus pattern being the first in 1982. In 1990, Lendl left adidas and contracted with Japanese company Mizuno for the remaining years of his career that ended in 1994.

Other famous players contracted with Adidas in the 80s were Stefan Edberg and Steffi Graf. The first Edberg collection came out in 1987, proving to be more popular than any of the subsequent ones. On the whole, Adidas launched six different Steffi Graf collections, three of them during the 80s - 1987, 1988 and 1989.